Kilim, a word of Turkish origin, denotes a pileless textile of many uses produced by one of several flatweaving techniques that have a common or closely related heritage and are practiced in the geographical area that includes parts of Turkey (Anatolia and Thrace), North Africa, the Balkans, the Caucasus, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Central Asia and China.

Although at times you may find kilim rugs included in the general genre of "oriental rugs", in more accepted practice, kilims are in a class of their own.

The major difference between a kilim area rug and a carpet or a pile rug is that whereas the design visible on a pile rugs is made by individual short strands of different color being knotted onto the warps and held together by pressing the wefts tightly, kilim designs are made by interweaving the variously colored wefts and warps, thus creating what is known as a flatweave.